The Telegraph

The Big Question: There’s an anti-intellectualism in Britain

The first of the Big Question debates at the Royal Opera House prompted composer Mark-Anthony Turnage to say there’s anti-intellectualism in Britain.

Classical Music Magazine

ABRSM’s new chief executive vows to improve infrastructure

The new chief executive of ABRSM says he will continue the work of his predecessor in improving the organisation’s infrastructure, following last year’s ‘major issues’ with exams.

BBC Music Magazine

Join us for this year’s BBC Music Magazine Awards

Champagne, canapés and live music with the classical music world

Classic FM

Valentina Lisitsa plays for stranded passengers

The YouTube sensation surprised passengers stranded at London’s St Pancras International Station, performing an impromptu concert after her Eurostar train was cancelled.

Vasily Petrenko extends RLPO contract

Chief conductor of the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra Vasily Petrenko has extended his contract for the foreseeable future, with a three-year notice period.

Classical Source

Top of The Baroque For Red Nose Day

This week on BBC Radio 3, presenters Suzy Klein, Sara Mohr-Pietsch, Jez Nelson and Tom Service will embark on a battle of classical prowess for Comic Relief, competing against each other to be crowned Top of the Baroque.

Marketplace Life (via Arts Journal)

Can I see your violin’s paperwork?

Imagine you’re traveling abroad. The to-do list can be long. Book your flight, pack a toothbrush — and if you’re a musician like John Thomas, you may soon need a passport for your instrument.

Classic FM

(Written on March 13, 2013 )

The Guardian

Tom Service on catchy contemporary opera

Anyone want to hear me hum Nixon in China?

The Observer

Don’t mourn HMV: there are far better places to browse for music now

Fan sites and online stores still provide the thrill of a voyage of discovery that the high street lost long ago

The Telegraph

Britten: the composer who had the last laugh

In the centenary year of Benjamin Britten, the reputation of the ‘difficult’ composer may be about to change, says Rupert Christiansen.

How we fell out of tune with the piano

Thousands of pianos are being sent to the scrap-heap despite having the ability to still tug at our heartstrings, Paul Kendall discovers.

Classic FM

Lang Lang sells out Royal Albert Hall in 48 hours

The pianist is performing an extra solo recital on November 17 2013 after selling 5000 tickets to his concert in two days.

BBC News

Les Miserables soundtrack tops UK album chart

The soundtrack to Tom Hooper’s Oscar-nominated Les Miserables has become the first cast recording to top the UK and Ireland album chart in 16 years.

Slipped Disc

European churches pay homage to John Tavener

The British composer, 68, has been announced as the 2013 winner of the Prize for European Church Music.

Music Week

PRS for Music Foundation to run new music talent development fund

The PRS For Music Foundation is to run a new Music Industry Talent Development Fund being launched by Arts Council England.

Generator

Two Wrongs Don’t Make a Copyright

The Featured Artists Coalition (FAC), and the Music Managers’ Forum (MMF), have responded with disappointment to Government proposals on copyright extensions, referring to them as a “massive windfall” for large labels but a “mixed bag” for artists.

The Telegraph

(Written on January 21, 2013 )

Gramophone

São Paulo Symphony Orchestra to record complete Villa-Lobos Symphonies

Naxos project will use entirely re-edited versions of the scores

Classic FM

Lindsey Stirling embraces video game music in Assassin’s Creed video

The latest high-concept video from violinist Lindsey Stirling celebrates music from the Assassin’s Creed video games.

Jeff Wayne re-imagines War Of The Worlds with Gary Barlow and Liam Neeson

Classic FM speaks to Jeff Wayne about the latest incarnation of his musical version of H.G. Wells’ War Of The Worlds, featuring Gary Barlow and Liam Neeson.

Classical stars light up Regent Street

Tine Ting Helseth and Noah Stewart will join Classic FM presenters John Suchet and Jamie Crick at the iconic Regent Street Christmas lights switch-on on Tuesday 13 November

Slipped Disc

Breakthrough! Orchestra to play off digital music stands

The Brussels Philharmonic has become the world’s first orchestra to abandon paper scores and play from a digital screen.

Deceptive Cadence

‘A Late Quartet’: Melodrama With A Pounding Musical Heart

After a quarter century together as one of the world’s top chamber music ensembles, the Fugue String Quartet is falling apart at the seams. A generation older than his colleagues, cellist Peter (Christopher Walken) is experiencing the early symptoms of Parkinson’s, and with his sudden retirement, a morass of long-buried resentments and pain come spewing out of his three younger partners: first violinist Daniel (Mark Ivanir), second violinist Robert (Philip Seymour Hoffman) and violist Juliette (Catherine Keener).

The Guardian

Toby Spence: ‘I’ll never take my voice for granted again’

Back on stage in the Metropolitan Opera’s Tempest, Toby Spence tells Tom Service about his recovery from cancer and surviving the storm

Boston.com

Holocaust opera to premiere in Austrian parliament

An opera focusing on Nazi atrocities against children will premiere next year at an unusual venue — Austria’s parliament.

Opera Now

Picasso inspires new Dublin Carmen 

International Leisure and Arts, Ireland’s foremost producer of international ballet, have announced their move into opera with a new production of Carmen by the Moscow State Opera – coming to Dublin in March 2013.

RTL.de (via Slipped Disc)

(Written on November 9, 2012 )

Classic FM

Personal Beethoven, Tchaikovsky and Gershwin letters to be auctioned

Letters from composers including Beethoven, Tchaikovsky and Gershwin are to be auction in LA next month.

Classic FM launches new Baroque timeline

Explore a fully interactive musical journey from 1600 to 1750, and get to the best Baroque composers with Classic FM’s brand new timeline.

Classical Music Magazine

Royal Philharmonic Society announces 200th birthday plans 

The Royal Philharmonic Society has announced a year of events to mark its bicentenary in 2013.

Slipped Disc

The Royal Opera House gets into bed for a quickie with Murdoch’s Sun

Should we, as most decent citizens would, avert our eyes from the celebrity shag of the century?

Exclusive: English orchestra to be abolished in savage local cuts

We’ve been leaked a report, going out tomorrow, which confirms that the Guildford Philharmonic Orchestra is ti be abolished under local authority cutbacks.

Sydney violin, stolen in Vienna, is returned to despairing owner

Emma West, assistant leader of the second violins in the Sydney Symphony Orchestra, had her violin grabbed by a thief as she rode the Vienna subway in September.

The Independent

The Week In Radio: Radio 3 needs an audience beyond this tiny elite

Is classical music really for everyone? This was the question posed by the writer and presenter Tom Service, chair of a live debate at the Sage in Gateshead as part of Radio 3′s Free Thinking festival, to which the answer is: if only.

Gramophone

Vladimir Ashkenazy to appear on BBC Radio 4’s ‘One to One’ – hear an excerpt!

Pianist and conductor speaks to Olivia O’Leary about how aging affects his career

Classic FM

(Written on November 8, 2012 )

Gramophone

Washington National Opera promotes Francesca Zambello to artistic director

Award-winning American opera director to begin new role in the New Year

The Guardian

John Cage meets Ant & Dec in the sitcom in my mind

Being involved in performances of Cage’s piece Indeterminacy, I’m making all kinds of bizarre connections with the avant-garde genius

Guardian Blog: Tom Service

Mercury prize shortlists: why no classical music?

If the Mercury 2012 judges want to reward fresh and dynamic new music, why has classical music disappeared from the list?

The Telegraph

Go out for dinner, or make musical history? The choice is yours

Buying a share in a new, yet-to-be-revealed work of art gives the thrill of knowing we’ve helped to bring something into being, without the burden of bearing the full cost, writes Ivan Hewett.

Arts Journal: Slipped Disc

Anne-Sophie Mutter kicks back fee to composers’ fund

The German violinist, playing in Norrkoping this weekend, has announced that she and the British conductor, Michael Francis, will donate their fees to a fund that will support young Swedish composers to write music for the orchestra

Classic FM

Vanessa-Mae Is Back Where She Belongs

She’s been off the scene for a while but Vanessa-Mae’s back with her most exciting disc to date.

Federico Colli wins Leeds International Piano Competition

The Leeds International Piano Competition winner has been announced as 24-year-old Federico Colli.

Classical music stops dogs barking, research shows

Classical music helps dogs spend more time sleeping and less time barking when they’re housed in kennels or temporary accommodation, new research claims.

The New York Times

Shocker Cools Into a ‘Rite’ of Passage

“THE RITE OF SPRING,” or “Le Sacre du Printemps,” Igor Stravinsky’s historic shocker, a ballet that shows and celebrates a remorseless human sacrifice, will be 100 years old next May. The bandwagon of centennial commemorations is getting an early start on Thursday with the New York Philharmonic.

Classic FM

(Written on September 17, 2012 )

Guardian

Tom Service on the Royal Albert Hall

‘My love affair with classical music’s moshpit’

Classic FM

Lang Lang to be Global Ambassador for Leeds Comp

The Leeds International Piano Competition, led by Dame Fanny Waterman, has selected Lang Lang as its Global Ambassador.

Deaf man hears Mozart for first time with new hearing aid

A deaf young filmmaker has heard music for the first time in his life, including Mozart’s Requiem.

Arts Journal: Limelight

Hahn-Bin no more: violinist changes name to Amadeus Leopold

Classical music’s most extreme hipster reinvents himself with a striking new stage name.

Los Angeles Times

Oh, those string players are so full of themselves

Yes, but what about the louts in the brass section? Orchestra members, so unified when on stage, enjoy poking fun at one another when off.

New York Times

Met Opera to Preserve Rush Tickets

When Agnes Varis, a Metropolitan Opera board member and benefactor, died a year ago, the company lost the person who paid for its heavily discounted rush ticket program.

Arts Journal: Slipped Disc

Breaking: Vienna’s Konzerthaus loses its chief

Bernhard Kerres has decided to quit after the coming centenary season. No obvious reason.

The Australian

Fate of opera season hangs in the balance

First it was the writers, then the visual artists, now the performing arts look likely to take a hit from Queensland Premier Campbell Newman as he attempts to control his state’s multi-billion-dollar debt. The fate of Opera Australia’s 2013 season in Brisbane remains undecided just a few days before the company’s season launch, causing artistic director Lyndon Terracini to tell The Australian he is “extremely worried”.

Classic FM

(Written on August 28, 2012 )

Daily Telegraph

Lang Lang at Latitude: should music festivals embrace classical?

Ivan Hewett wonders if classical music can cope with the great outdoors.

Independent

World’s first sex trafficking opera to premiere in the UK

Anya17 opens at the Liverpool Philharmonic today. The opera tackles the difficult subject of women forced in to prostitution.

Guardian

Close to you

Accompanists: The unsung heroes of music. Tom Service pays homage to the musicians condemned to sitting in the shadows.

Intermezzo

Tristan Und Isolde Und The CBSO.

This was a static Tristan und Isolde, even by concert version standards. But four enthralling hours proved that sometimes the music really is all that matters.

Jessica Duchen’s Classical Music Blog

How To Be Part Of Rox’s Love Album.

Jessica Duchen on the London premiere of Roxanna Panufnik‘s Four World Seasons.

Opera Chic

Bringing Out Brahms.

The definitive schedule for the 49th Festival Pianistico Internazionale of Brescia and Bergamo has been rolled out, titled “Brahms, the conservative progressive” in homage to the complex character of the German composer.

Arts Journal: Slipped Disc

Another Mahler Howler.

Norman Lebrecht on a Mahler Prize by the city of Klagenfurt, in southern Austria, which requires entrants to set a 1967 poem by Patti Smith.

(Written on March 7, 2012 )

The Telegraph

Jonathan Harvey: Spirits Soar In The Hands Of A Master.

For truly spiritual music, you need to turn to Jonathan Harvey, says Ivan Hewett.

Jessica Duchen’s Classical Music Blog

Debussy’s Bustin’ Out All Over

Jessica Duchen celebrates 150 years since the composer’s birth.

The Guardian

Tom Service: Gustav Leonhardt: Precision, Coolness, Brilliance – And Alfa Romeos.

Gustav Leonhardt was the most austere of the fathers of the Early Music movement. But there’s more to his personality, and playing, than intellectual rigour – even if he did wear the sharpest suits of any harpsichordist, ever…

Behind The Music: What If The Culture Industry Shut Down For A Day?

Wikipedia went black in protest against anti-piracy legislation. But which would you miss more: an encyclopaedia or music?

Robin Gibb To Honour Titanic Victims In First ‘Classical’ Composition.

Titanic Requiem – which will be composed by Bee Gees singer and son – will be played by the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2012/jan/20/robin-gibb-titanic-victims-classical-piece-1

(Written on January 20, 2012 )

Every day the WildKat team scan the newspapers and blogs online to bring you a digested list of the day’s classical music news.

LA Times

L.A. Phil Live schedule announced

The three Los Angeles Philharmonic concert simulcasts will include a performance of Mahler’s ‘Symphony of a Thousand’ from Caracas, Venezuela.

The Guardian

Gok Wan: ‘Opera takes you on a journey’ – video

Gok Wan talks from Glyndebourne about what opera means to him – and why greater access to the art form means you can now enjoy it at home in your pyjamas. ‘For me, that’s exactly what opera should be,’ he says

The Guardian

Viktoria Mullova: from Russia in a blond wig

Viktoria Mullova fled the USSR because she hated it. The violinist tells Erica Jeal what finally returning to her homeland has meant for her music.

Tom Service: The Guardian

Why Arnold Bax will make it a Prom night to remember

The Royal Philharmonic Orchestra’s rare performance of Bax’s work will thrill you. All you have to do is park your prejudices at the door.

The Times

Review – Simon Rattle: Schoenberg

“A mellow and warm sound, but sometimes Schoenberg’s glitter effects fail to come through as they should.”

The Times

My haunting relationship with Benjamin Britten

Janette Heffernan was the first girl to sing in the composer’s ghost opera; the start of a haunting relationship, she says.

(Written on August 19, 2011 )

Every day the WildKat team scan newspapers, websites and blogs for interesting classical music news, and now we’ve decided to publish our lists so that you can get a classical music news summary each day. If you’ve read anything interesting each day that we’ve missed do feel free to comment and let us know!

London 2012: Cultural Olympiad to feature Music Nation

Weekend festival Music Nation will take place in March next year as part of the Cultural Olympiad.

Nico Muhly: ‘Wearing a mask frees you to say anything’

Ivan Hewett meets ‘the hottest young composer around’.

Is pianistic perfection all that it’s cracked up to be?

Tom Service thinks note-perfect performances are unrealisable.

BBC SO goes ‘Out + About’ – to the Westfield Shopping Centre

The outreach project linked to the BBC Proms will see the orchestra also performing in the Natural History Museum and Waterloo Station.

(Written on June 16, 2011 )